Share Your Story

“Even with our close relationship, there was a part of my father that was like a dark closet he couldn’t open up.”-son of a WWII veteran

“Growing up in the shadow of the Vietnam War has a huge effect on you and I started to think there are tragically few who know what this thing is all about. Why have I heard and read so little about growing up with a veteran’s PTSD?”-daughter of Vietnam vet

Videos of WWII veterans sharing their experience of liberating the Concentration Camps in Germany:

In our rational minds, we know that giving voice to traumatic memories, whether through writing or speaking, and expressing our pain or sorrow is cathartic. We know that it can bring healing relief. Research on PTSD confirms that this is especially true for veterans of war.

Yet many veterans try to lock away their memories so they can assimilate back into civilian life. Their silence is also to protect their children. But, then as years go by, the thought of unlocking the memories becomes scary, threatening. In a cruel irony, the silence keeps the memories potent.

But, the pain of their parents’ isn’t lost on the adult children of veterans. And when the children are old enough to know and want to know about what their fathers or grandfathers experienced in battle, they often sense that the subject is off limits. In turn, the parent believes the child is not interested in hearing.

So the walls of silence stay in place, isolating loved ones from one another.

We children can connect with our parent through asking, through demonstrating that we are indeed able and ready to hear, that we want to listen and be present.

It is not easy to hear what they have held within their silent rage or grief. Sometimes we may wish we had stayed ignorant. But we children with this shared experience can be there for one another as we embark on crossing over into this new terrain of hearing the unspeakable.

And we can remind one another of the reward of building that bridge to our parent: that we are freeing them and ourselves from isolation.

As well as encouraging and helping you to begin the conversation with your parent, the Veterans’ Children community encourages you to recognize and share your story of how your parent’s trauma has shaped you. When did you become aware of your father’s or mother’s pain? What relationship did you develop with their silence?